LETTERS: Moore endorses Porter for re-election as village trustee

As the spouse of current Cazenovia Village Trustee, Dave Porter, it has been a revelation for me to observe the amount of time, dedication and effort that is expended by a village trustee in the course of fulfilling his or her responsibilities. As with most jobs, there is a learning curve as one develops working relationships with other village officials and employees.

Each trustee is tasked with chairing several committee assignments, in addition to attending regular village board meetings. One becomes familiar with current challenges, such as lack of downtown parking, need to monitor the health of the lake and the trade-offs between encouraging business growth versus need to protect our village’s historic character.

The pressing issues of the village’s aging infrastructure is one area, for example, where Dave’s expertise as a licensed professional mechanical engineer and LEED accredited professional (energy management and sustainable practices) can contribute a deep understanding of how to evaluate issues needing technical solutions.

Appropriately, Dave is the trustee contact assigned to attend meetings of the Lake Watershed Council and Cazenovia Lake Association.

He has successfully administered several duties involving village facilities and personnel. Dave has served as fire commissioner for the past two years. One achievement in this area was the purchase of the 6 Farnham St. building for emerging uses by the Cazenovia Fire Department.

For this task he was involved in more than 100 phone calls to discuss and negotiate the acquisition. He served on the search committee to hire the current Cazenovia police chief and acts as the village health insurance liaison.

Recently, he oversaw the interview process and successful hire of the new director for the Joint Youth Recreation Program, upon the retirement of Joe Fallon. As parks and recreation trustee, Dave was up at 5 a.m. last Saturday to oversee the opening of the Lakeside Park boat launch for the 2012 season, having hired new launch employees earlier in the spring.